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Maztica
'''Maztica '''is an elusive, mystical oriental continent located in the Far East of Middle-Earth, exclusive to the ''Aeon of the Champion ''story series. Due to isolationism and a lack of outsider exploration, it has developed its own history parallel to that of the rest of the world, and until recently was untouched by the stain of war - though it had already been afflicted by something much worse. It comprises the island Changuu, where Lo'Shin was imprisoned during his Days of Affliction. History Early development and War of the Dragons During the Ordering of Middle-Earth which took place after the Sin Wars, the supercontinent of Old Vigrith began to flourish like never before. With the Princes of Hell sequestered, their influence no longer choked the land, and thus, the Wild Gods developed; most of them in the west of the planet near the Midnight Glade, where they were revered by the night elves, one of the first sentient races on the world. Further southeast, a similar phenomenon was occuring. However, the Wild Gods of the Orient were not as calm as those on the Occident. Indeed, they were catastrophically more violent, clashing with each other in several disastrous wars that caused tectonic shifts within the fabric of the land itself, each time permanently altering its structure. They were a group of powerful beings known as the Dragon Kings, each ruling over a river system in the continent, and each King was attempting to become the Dragon Emperor by destroying the others and taking on their powers. Each King embodied a different theme: the azure dragon, Ao Guang, was the essence of spring. The red dragon, Ao Qin, was the essence of summer. Ao Run, the white dragon, was the essence of autumn. Lastly, Ao Shun, the black dragon, was the essence of winter. To stop their dangerous struggle, around 800 years before the rise of the trolls, the Earth Watchers contacted their Earthen servants, ordering them to fight their way to Maztica and sequester the Dragon Kings before the angels were forced to intervene on the planet again. Thus, Naz'gomal and some of the other Earthen warriors rallied the angels who had remained on the planet after the Sin Wars and took the fight to the Dragon Kings. Thriving on chaos, their weakness was the order-bringing magic of the Light, and one by one, they were brought down. Ao Qin was the hardest of the four dragon kings to defeat, as his raging temper and powerful fire magic resisted all attempts to calm him down. He saw Light magic as energy, and hungrily fed on it thinking it would increase his power. Thus, playing to his weakness, Naz'gomal fed the dragon more and more Light magic until he became oversaturated, causing his body to uncontrollably expand and burst in the infernal spectacle of the century. His remains were collected and stored away by the Earthen in processing facilities near the site of Ragnar the Mighty's Monument. Ao Qin was dead in body, but everyone knew he would, over thousands of years, reform in spirit. Thus, the Earthen wanted to remain on the planet to find a solution to this potential return. Demonic taint and rise of the Qilan Beelzebub was recovering from his imprisonment in the meantime, and disliked the Re-Ordering intensely. He thus decided to use the opportunity to spread more taint. His hellish whispers emanated from the depths of the planet's crust itself, staining the minds of the Earthen who worked on the continent, greatly reducing their powers. Naz'gomal noticed this worrying trend and began to panic, through fear that the demons may be on the rise again if he wasn't able to keep the ordering at the current rate. The Earthen began to feel lethargic and useless, as if they had been stripped of all their energy. As a cure to this condition, the Earthen leaders made a dangerous suggestion: suffusing the souls of the Earthen with some of the essence of the dragon kings. This was a leap of faith, and it could have disastrous consequences - but the deed was done. Khar'zoth had Earthen researchers weave a small portion of essence from the spirit of Ao Guang to a group of volunteers, and the results were recorded. Fascinatingly, an exponential rise in power was reported, with the engineered Earthen losing all feelings of lethargy and listlessness. They completed their tasks with renewed vigor, while also showing an increased resistance to demonic possession. This pleased Shemyaza, Lord of the Watchers, who allowed the process to be repeated on the spirits of Ao Run and Ao Shun, and in time, Beelzebub's plans had apparently been thwarted. The Earthen engineered evolved into a powerful race known as the Qilan, chimeroids with fiery scales and antler-like horns growing out of their heads. The project had been a success, it seemed. Things started going wrong when the Qilan began expanding. They soon colonised the majority of Maztica for themselves, building powerful kingdoms based on the slavery of the less-powerful of their race, and in pursuit of power began violent crackdowns on any outsiders. Ten Tsux, the most powerful Qilan Emperor to date, entered the Spirit Isles where Ragnar's tomb lay and did battle with keeper Naz'gomal for control of the centre, believing it to be a source of ancient power for which would increase the might of their civilisation. Successive generations of dragon essence-breeding had groomed him into a fierce opponent, and Tsux destroyed Naz'gomal and his allies in a single thundersweep, dooming all the other races of Maztica to millenia of slavery and darkness. He is said to have cackled like thunder itself as the moon set on the continent. The Qilan ruled Maztica for what seemed like eternities afterwards, with successive Emperors taking over and making the empire stronger and stronger, while their greed grew greater and greater. All of this being the influence of Beelzebub, who had turned the once-noble race into materialistic savages who wasted their power and resources on trying to acquire more. The Return of Ao Qin 9,000 years before the opening of the Genesis Portal, Ao Qin - the malevolent, deposed red Dragon King - returned to the living world as a vengeful spirit looking for a host body. Forshad, the reigning Qilan Emperor, was supremely confident in racial power and was determined to build the Qilan an empire that transcended the frontiers of reality. By this time the effects of Beelzebub's corruption were becoming pronounced, and though they grew in power, the Qilan lost their sense of direction. They began to fight among themselves, squabble among themselves, and this nearly led to a civil war between Forshad and the other Qi sorcerers. This meant that they lost control over their slaves, and the other Maztican races - namely the ticapan - were able to slip out of the iron grip of serfdom that had held them for so long. The ticapan revolutionaries were led by the spiritual, nature-minded Seer Kwang, who had spent his free years learning the ways of the monk. By the time of the real revolution, he was a powerful practicioner of martial arts, and taught the other pan his ways. They were the only family he ever knew, the students, and became powerful enough to stand up to the cruel Qilan. After Forshad sorted out his popularity problems at home, he was disgusted to see that the slaves had revolted. He sent qilan soldiers in force to re-subjugate them, but the chaos instigated by Beelzebub's taint caused disorder within their regiments which Forshad had been far too ignorant to see. Indeed, though outnumbered, the slaves slowly pushed back the Qilan, whose losses in the war resulted in regression to prior ways. Furious with his accumulation of defeats and the loss of face they caused, he accused the Qilan of softening over the years, claiming that prosperity had made them weaker. He became single-mindedly committed to purging Maztica of the genetically inferior, and thus retreated to Spirit Isles once again to reclaim his former glory. The rebels gained ground as a result, all the way to the Isles themselves. Reaching the Shadow Summit, Forshad followed the trail treaded by his ancestors, in search of the legendary power source that lay at its crux. Unbeknownst to him, it was the spirit of Ao Qin looking for his old body. Both of them appeared in the same place at the same time, and when they met, the result was not pleasant. As soon as the evil spirit came across a free body, it attempted to attached itself onto Forshad's soul, but Forshad's own inner spirit resisted him, pushing him out. A furious battle of the spirits emerged, with fireworks and thunderclaps galore atop the Shadow Summit. The two spirits clashed bitterly such that the Summit around them began to collapse, first regularly, but then pyroclastically. Seeing the danger, Kwang instructed his now-victorious rebels not to chase Forshad into oblivion. Instead, they began to hastily combine their monk powers to build a shield around the Spirit Isles, locking them off from any outside intervention and containing the effects of the Summit standoff. Kwang knew that Forshad had doomed his people, and did not want to see his pan make his mistake. Thus, the pan returned home to establish their own kingdom. War of the Ancients and Sundering The War of the Ancients largely eluded Maztica, as the fighting was concentrated on demons entering a portal created by the smurfs to summon Sargamon onto Middle-Earth. However, this did not mean demons from within weren't able to succeed where demons from without could not. Beelzebub was not quite finished with the continent, and his whispers once again infiltrated into ticapan society. However, the pan refused to be manipulated as the qilan had been. Du'Yin, the Monk Lord, gathered his fellow monks together and they collectively expunged all demonic taint from within their bodies, before trapping and sealing it into containers made from a special, supposedly demon-proof material. These containers were then floated off of the continent, hopefully to never make contact with a tica again. This would later prove to be a costly mistake for isolationism. The Champion During the events of the Bleakest Night in 86 BGY, the Smurf Village was invaded during a Night Raid conducted by agents of the Nightwatch, who had detected traces of arcanum in the area. This was as a result of Papa Smurf deputising leadership of the village, and the resulting imprudent use of magic by his deputies. When they descended upon the village, the smurfs were defenceless and soon scattered. Not only was their home destroyed, razed to the ground by the invading vigilantees (including the Village Dam and laboratory) but Papa Smurf, while conjuring a shield to keep any more of the attackers from entering the village, was cut down by a Dark Paladin. His last words were a cry of desperation to his son, Lo'Shin, who was only a 29-year-old smurfling at the time. Hearing the dying cries of their ill-fated leader, the other smurfs, at Brainy's command, temporarily regrouped in order to rescue Lo'Shin. He was Papa Smurf's only begotten son, and the youngest in the village at that. Hurriedly, they put together a basket of leaves and hid him in it, before trying to make off with him. They surmised that if they could smuggle him out, at least they would not lose the one thing holding their community together. Unfortunately, they were intercepted by a gang of mercenaries not privy to the original village siege, and in the scramble to get away, Lo'Shin was captured. Being a smurf, the mercenaries had little idea what he was, but did surmise that selling him could make them a quick buck. Thus, they carried him back overleaf with them, marking the total devastation of the smurf race. It is unknown how, but eventually, Lo'Shin ended upon on the shores of Maztica, and was delivered into the hands of Qilan tribe. They took him back to their camp as a slave, and he laboured intensely at their behest. Though he did much work for them during his enslavement, they did not regard him as much, and only relented killing him because it would inconvenience their race, not because it was immoral. Thus, while not outright killed, the smurf was regularly bullied, hectored and beaten into submission, which had the long-term effect of diminishing his self-worth and image. Several times while in custody, he did attempt to take his own life. As Lo'Shin aged, markings similar to tattoos became visible on his body. He had two of them, both running the length of his arms, and they appeared to be written in a weird, inscrutable language. Lo'Shin himself could not understand them, yet they for whatever reason meant something to him personally. Likewise, the Qilan did not understand and could not decipher the exact meanings, but this did not stop them from interpreting them anyway. According to their religion, the markings were a sign of divinity; that said child was blessed of the gods and worthy of utmost reverence - at least, according to a local wild priest. In an instant, their attitude towards him changed. They began to worship Lo'Shin was a godly being. Mir Sunchol, the leader of that tribe, had him dressed in holy regalia and placed the iron sacred crown of storms upon his head, consecrating him as proof of the eminence of some ancient prophesy. The irony lay in his correctness. No longer a slave, Lo'Shin was free to develop himself as a character, and it is around this time that he learned of his powers. The Qilan, seeing these powers, further confirmed their own biases, and sought to draw his power for their own benefit. The Second War of the Dragon In -69, the long-lost Emperor Forshad returned - with a monstrous new body. Millennia of torment at the hands of the malevolent red Dragon King, Ao Qin, had transmutated him into a true eldritch horror. Dragonflame coursed through his veins in the place of blood, and fire departed from his lips in place of air. His soul, once proud and independent, was now the receptacle of the spirit of a terrible evil. His return was threatening to destroy what was many years of peace on Maztica, if it meant reclaiming his former glory through imperial conquest. The other Qilan were disgusted by what he proported to be, and wanted Lo'Shin to use his power to awaken the other Dragon Kings in the hope that they would unite against him. However, the smurfling despised the idea, as his conscience told him that the Qilan were not sincere in their motives. Plus, there was a danger that now that Forshad was possessed by Ao Qin, the dragon king would use him to consume the essence of the other three dragon kings, making Ao Qin the Dragon Emperor - the yellow dragon - and if this happened, all of Maztica would be doomed forever. On the night of the war, Lo'Shin fled from the Qilan in secret, and did not stop running until he reached the wilderness. There, he lived as an oddity among the wildlife, constantly wandering the territory. Being mortal, however, was dangerous in those parts without family, and the smurf soon found himself dangerous close to death several times - even if the eldritch creatures of the land did him no harm, starvation and disease would. Fortunately for him, he stumbled upon a Yanguol encampment; the race-friendly camp members allowed him to lodge at their place for the time being. However, residency was never permanent, and the Qilan soon came looking for him. Fearful of repercussions, the yanguol revealed the location of their guest, and Mir Sunchol ordered his arrest and return to mainland Maztica. Upon hearing that he had been betrayed, Lo'Shin once again fled, leaving the forest with the Qilan on his tail. After days of pursuit, he reached a body of water, and realised that he'd either be captured or drown. The smurf intended to turn himself in, but lost his balance and slipped into the sea. By the time the Qilan arrived at the scene, Lo'Shin was nowhere to be found, and thus, they called off the search for him, disheartened that their god was lost. Category:Aeon of the Champion articles Category:Aeon of the Champion locations Category:Continents Category:Kingdoms Category:Locations Category:Countries